


Dreams and Wishes

by nagi_schwarz



Series: Comment Fic 2016 [3]
Category: Aladdin (1992), Beauty and the Beast (1991), Cinderella (1950), Mulan (1998), Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937), Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles - All Media Types, The Little Mermaid (1989)
Genre: Crack, Crossover, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-01
Updated: 2016-04-01
Packaged: 2018-05-30 11:52:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 845
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6422863
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nagi_schwarz/pseuds/nagi_schwarz
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Written for genre AU comment_fic prompt: Fairy tales, any princess, martial arts film AU. Cinderella doesn't really want to go to the ball.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Dreams and Wishes

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Roundtressym](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Roundtressym/gifts).



Cinderella isn’t interested in going to the ball. While her step-sisters fuss and fret over what they’re going to wear for the three months leading up to the ball, Cinderella makes other plans. She knows what her stepmother and step-sisters think of her, and she doesn’t care. They think she spends what little free time she has in the cellars, among the cinders, weeping for her lost parents and the injustice the world has heaped upon her. Let them think it. Better they never know that one of the rats who lives in the cellars is a martial arts master, and he and his four students (turtles, of all things, the friendships of animals will never cease to amaze her - if the birds can help her do laundry, why can’t the rats and turtles teach her to fight?) tutor her in the ancient ways of ninjitsu.  
  
So she practices, and she practices, and she trains. She treats each heavy chore as an opportunity to build her strength and stamina. She bears each insult quietly, because opponents will insult her during a match, and she cannot lose her head.  
  
She cleans and sweeps, mops and scrubs, dusts and polishes, and as she works she pictures it, her perfect fight, from the first strike to the final blow, and she knows, when the time comes, she will win. Her step-sisters think going to the ball and marrying the prince will let them escape from their stepmother. All it will do is saddle them with an equally overbearing mother-in-law. Winning the unarmed combat tournament will give Cinderella a ticket to the rest of the world.

She pretends to be hurt and sad when her stepmother turns down her request to attend the ball, predicating her attendance upon finding a dress and completing her chores. She pretends to be horrified when her step-sisters ruin her dress. She is just glad they didn’t find her uniform, which the rat and turtles painstakingly helped her design and sew.  
  
She lets her stepmother lock her away.  
  
And then she is out the window and down the tower and taking a horse from the stables and riding for the capital at full speed. Few women enter the tournament at all, and all of them are from other kingdoms. Fa Mulan has the look of a soldier, rides in on a horse and armor. Princess Jasmine wears her scimitar with the calm competence of one who has wielded weapons all her life. Ariel tells of how she swims long distances daily to build up her strength; she looks as though her claims are true, for she is lean and strong and lithe. Belle tells of how she grew up riding horses and wrestling wolves in the forest. She is slight, bookish, but has a core of steel. Snow White was raised a hunter, worked the mines alongside sturdy dwarves, and eats a healthy diet of apples and cheese. She is formidable.  
  
But Cinderella has what none of the rest of them have - years and years of fury. She has waited for this chance all her life, and no one will take it from her. So she says nothing about her time or her training, lets them coo over the pets she brought with her in support, the rat and the four turtles (Snow White has a songbird, Belle a dog, Ariel a fish, Jasmine a tiger, Mulan a miniature dragon).  
  
And when they step into the ring, she decimates each of them. They lose gracefully, rally behind her as she climbs the ranks, and when the final fight comes, against Prince Charming himself, Cinderella doesn’t pull her punches. The fight is precisely as she imagined it, from first strike to final blow, and when he is down on the ground, crying for mercy, she knows all the dreaming and wishing she has done has been for something.  
  
She is the best in the land. She is free.  
  
Prince Charming bounces up to his feet as soon as the referee declares the fight finished.  
  
“Hey, ninja,” he says to her, because she wears a traditional mask, “what’s your name? I love a woman who can kick my ass.”  
  
“My name is of no consequence,” she says, because she’s going to take the prize money and run.  
  
“Come to the ball with me tonight,” he says, keeping his voice low.  
  
“You’re supposed to find your future wife at the ball.”  
  
“Maybe I found her here.”  
  
“Not part of the plan, Highness,” Cinderella says. She hoists her trophy and her bag of winnings high so the crowd can cheer once more, and then she goes to speak to Mulan about opening a fighting school for women. Each of the other women extend gracious invitations to her, to come visit them in their kingdoms and teach them and their women her fighting skills, and she promises to visit.  
  
But first, she is going to take the rat and his turtles to their home.  
  
She’s heard so much about pizza, and now she will finally get to try it.


End file.
